Leadership lacking - ideas???

We recently met someone in our neighborhood who has a son interested in attending USNA Class of 20. His son goes to a small classical school, has great grades, ACT score, and sports. He is not a class/SGA officer, and is not in Boy Scouts.

Any thoughts on leadership ideas? His father said that he thought the leadership area of his resume was comparatively weak, and he asked for ideas to beef up that area.

Agree with job responsibilities (jobs like life guarding or umpire/ref show leadership/responsibility), officer positions in NHS or student council, mission trips or youth group leadership, volunteer activities where leadership is shown/given, team captain of a sport (as long as the title goes along with leadership responsibilities), DECA or other ECAs that involve leadership.

Since my school doesn't offer sports or student government, my leadership consists of publication positions; I'm the Editor of both the newspaper and the yearbook. In addition, I've been asked to train newer employees at my job. When I was asked about that stuff during one of my nomination interviews, the team seemed rather impressed; I was really surprised. I thought all they cared about was sports, student govt., and Girl Scouts, but apparently that's not the case! So, maybe suggest that he gets involved with the school publications... also, suggest finding a job at a small, mom-and-pop business. I've found that one is more likely to move up to a management position in a small business than in a big, chain, corporate business (that finding is based on both personal experience and the experiences of my friends). Best of luck to him!!

The best answer is find leadership role(s) in activities that individual already does. Yes, it is great to be a sports team captain, to be the newspaper/TV/yearbook editor/producers, student government, etc....those are all good! HOWEVER, my argument is don't do things as a "check in the box." As I stated, find leadership in activity that one regularly does. For example, if an individual is heavily involved in community service, then organize and setup multiple service projects -- organize it, plan it, manage workers/volunteers, etc. At one USNA Admissions Forum the same kind of question came up....as an example, one of the Regional Directors said they had one candidate who ran to become mayor of very small town (I think it was in the Midwest). The candidate couldn't legally become mayor because of their age (I am not sure how the person could run in the first place, but apparently they did). The Admissions Board was very impressed. The point the RD was trying to make was that you don't have to do the "traditional" ECAs. In fact, I think a candidate has a better chance of "standing out" if their leadership-based activities are unique and can "wow" the Admissions Board (and there are plenty of ways to do that) . That isn't to say that one should sacrifice other areas (i.e. sports) -- hence the whole person concept.